A New Chapter

My partner and I have been anticipating this for some time, but this past week our other player finally messaged my partner, the GM (Game Master), saying that he would need to drop out of the campaign. It didn't really come as a surprise, but it was disappointing. We're still on good terms; life just intervened.

Since we were anticipating this outcome, we had already begun creating new characters to fill out the party so we could continue the story on our own. I'm invested in my character, Cael, and want to see not only their story but the campaign's story reach its conclusion. I've been playing the long game with them, and some things are just now beginning to tick into motion.

Thus begins a transition.

My partner and I were prepared to continue using Pathfinder 2e as our primary system for telling the story, but we've...outgrown it. As a beginner to role-playing games, Pathfinder 2e provided me a necessary framework for visualizing how certain spells, abilities, and effects worked. It wasn't ambiguous. Everything had a mechanical application, and certain feats or spells allowed for certain outcomes. I loved it for that reason, because I have difficulty pulling ideas out of the ether, which was one of the problems I had with the Root TTRPG.

My mind just isn't wired to mark off vague inventory slots to remove the exact item I want at any moment. I like to, as Derik from Knights of Last Call termed it, pixel-bitch my items. I like knowing what I can do, what I have on me, and then work within those specific limitations, because that's how my creativity thrives. The other method tends to be just too nebulous for my tastes, which is why Pathfinder 2e was--was-- the perfect system for me for a long time.

However, the limitations that the rules create because of how well it's balanced became more and more stifling, not just for me but for the GM as well. You can't do something because there's a feat for it, but you can actually attempt to try it just at a higher difficulty, but can you really know whether you're adjusting correctly if you don't know the feat even exists? There's no way the average GM or even an above average GM will memorize every single feat within the game just to know how to balance it correctly on the fly if someone without said feat attempts that particular action.

It's too much. There are too many spells, too many feats, and overall most of them just aren't that great. Complexity is fine, but complicated causes headaches, and Paizo is so concerned with adding more, more, more! that it collapses under its own weight of options. Maybe if we played more consistently like we used to we wouldn't have time to analyze the granular and could enjoy the game for what it is, but consistency was thrown out the window long before our other player officially left, and in our idleness, we've picked apart at the system, annoyed how no matter which way you turn, there's a wall to block your path. Even working within confines has its limits.

Our tastes changed as the campaign evolved. We began Pathfinder 2e for the mechanics, but that desire for structure changed over time as we began to naturally play a more narrative game. PF2e is functional, but it's not necessarily the best fit.

So, we've been looking at Daggerheart, since it was just officially released by Darrington Press. We don't have the book, but the SRD (System Reference Document) is available online for free from the website along with the necessary tools to get you on your feet for running the game.

The primary issue with transitioning to a new system, aside from us possibly doing so smack dab in the middle of an already well-established campaign, is matching the flavor of the character just right. Cael is a magical savant with a special connection to the shadows. In PF2e terms, they're a Sorcerer-turned-Bard (story beat moment that happened), with a Wizard Archetype and Ritualist Dedication, which is just jargon that says they're really good at socializing and magic and are able to cast a vast array of spells on both a large and small scale. I was really looking forward to unlocking some of my higher level feats because of how I'd fit them into the narrative. If we switch, those feats vanish.

At a first glance, Daggerheart seems much more limited in scope for how Cael was developing. How do I stay true to the core character within the sparseness of the system's multi-classing? The last thing we want to do is disrupt the fiction, because the sudden loss of an ability would destroy the suspension of disbelief from a storytelling perspective. I'm the type of person where something can't change, 'just because.' It needs to make sense.

After looking through some of the options, I'm tentatively hopeful we can make it work, because overall Daggerheart just fits the way we're telling our story so much better than Pathfinder 2e does. The threat of death isn't much of a threat of us, but the heightened threat of a negotiation gone wrong and the implications of succeeding at a cost (aka, succeeding with Fear as it's called in the system) makes for a much more compelling and suspenseful narrative when much of the narrative revolves around social drama.

If we do switch fully to Daggerheart, the main difference we're already considering implementing, aside from creating our own Ritual rules, is dual-GMing so that it's not just up to my partner to plan and run everything outside of how my character(s) act. I honestly think the system could lend itself well to dual-GMs, since it relies so heavily on player involvement anyway, so that's something to look forward to.

In the meantime, while we decide how to proceed, I'll be going back and finishing Teyr'loch Delter Pach. I'm caught up on transcribing, have only one journal to fully write along with a couple others to edit, and don't have to worry about writing Dream Messages or Sendings. Aside from working out and keeping up with my composing, I can direct all of my attention to the completion of this performance, then to character creation.

Other Notable Accomplishments:

• Transcribing

  • Completed the rest of 118, which became 119

  • Transcribed 116 & 117

• BWS Intermediate Program

  • Doing pull-ups with the blue band has gotten much easier; able to do ~8 on average across 4 sets with one foot out of the band, meaning I'll be able to decrease the band size and resistance soon; I'm not looking forward to the lifting curve....

  • Was able to do dumbbell preacher curls with a 15 lb weight at the bare minimum rep range for the sets, which is a massive improvement, considering with the 10 lb weight I could easily go above the maximum rep amount; the problem was that with my current dumbbells, there's no nice 2.5 lb increase between the 10 & 15 mark & 5 lbs was just too much of an increase--until now!

• Music Composition

  • Completed Section 5, practicing period and phrase group writing

    

  • Completed Section 6, practicing augmentation and diminution of motifs and phrases

    

Questions for Contemplation & Discussion:

• How do you handle stress or disappointment? For me, I tend to seek comfort in food. Case in point, when we discovered our other player was dropping out, we binged on pizza and ice cream. Surprisingly, my weight the next morning didn't fluctuate, so that was nice.

• How well do you acclimate to change? Are you a go-with-the-flow type of person? Are you unyielding until the bitter end? Do you see opportunity where others might only see obstacles?

  • Sudden changes tend to stress me out pretty severely. My older sister, however, has a knack for rolling with the punches. I'm working on seeing opportunities instead of obstacles, but man, it does not come naturally to me.

This Week's Obligatory Cat Pic: Mura

Me after bingeing pizza and ice cream.